Again I apologise for my radio silence. The last two weeks seem to have been an endless blur of cleaning up half digested food/nappy contents and I cannot tell you how much Dettol has been used to prevent this from spreading further.
Living in London, you're forever warned about the hygiene of fellow commuters who all seem to sneeze without covering their mouths and noses, yawn loudly and incessantly sniff like they were never told that it's rude and to blow your nose (I was constantly). The same is said of the cleanliness of surfaces on a tube train due to some people's lack of hand washing. It is no wonder that norovirus (a milder form of gastroenteritis) and viral infections are rife during the winter months here. Antibacterial gel is a must have in any handbag. It is more a wonder if you don't catch anything so it is with pride that I can say that I have never (touch wood) caught anything other than a cold while commuting. I appreciate how damning this sounds and also how gross I'm making commuters sound but it is not all commuters and given the swathes of people who use transport in London, one person not washing their hands or using gel after sneezing for example and touching a railing spreads a cold/flu like wildfire. Commuting aside, the other breeding ground would be a nursery...
We are now 5 days in and my son is still off food. We have offered him literally everything we have in our house but still no dice. What I can be grateful for is that he will drink milk and water so he isn't dehydrated. Obviously for a 14month old this isn't the best diet but at least he's getting some nutrition and not losing any more weight - a huge relief for an anxious mum. The worst of mine lasted for 24 hours but whilst I'm still feeling niggles when I eat and I'm not back to eating the amount I usually would, I'm still managing 3 meals a day plus some snacks. Thankfully, we have some reprieve in that today my son was looked after by my mum. My son absolutely adores her and is generally well behaved for her so this could be the breakthrough we need to kickstart his eating again. I'm keeping my fingers firmly crossed as it's heartbreaking to see my baby boy this way.
One thing that seems to have helped albeit only a little is camomile tea. For some it may seem odd and extremely English that I would choose to brew a cuppa for my son but it's natural soothing qualities were appealing and frankly, I'm not a fan of giving my son medicine for no reason. As far as I know, there is no medicine to cure an upset stomach for a toddler and I refuse to use something general like Calpol. Strangely, my son loved it except for when I tried to sneakily add sugar to give him some energy! Whilst I won't fully advocate camomile tea, it seemed to work for us. One concern I had though was that I had read a lot of teas naturally contain tannin which affects the absorption of iron. Being anaemic myself I would usually try and avoid things like this but the plus side of settling my son's stomach outweighed my concerns when using the following logic. I assume firstly that my son would have to be consuming more than the occasional 4oz I gave him for this to make an extreme difference to his iron levels, I secondly could find no definitive answer as to whether camomile tea does contain tannin and if it does, that it's on the lower end of the scale.
I'm not a bohemian mother by any means, I'm certainly not chilled out like one but I do prefer to solve upsets as naturally as possible when it comes to health. That being said, I refuse to subscribe to health fads like buying a smoothie maker... it's a blender people and you already have one! Hopefully my son is on the path to recovery so I can start relaxing again. Having an unwell son is such an emotional rollercoaster!
~AB~
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